Lean Solutions for Retail

The constant evolution of omni-channel retail has added complexity to the ability to manage inventory, schedule employees, and maintain a consistent, top-tier customer experience. Add to that proliferating technologies, frequent process change, and growing reporting needs and it’s no wonder retail managers spend 30-45% of their time on non-value added activities – time that could be spent increasing top line sales, reducing operating costs, and increasing customer experience and loyalty.

Speed counts, and efficiency is the key

In order to remain competitive, retailers must continue to find ways to deliver better and faster service at a lower cost. In this environment, time can be the most powerful competitive advantage. Build omni-channel operations that respond quickly to serve customers and preempt competitors, and your organization will grow profitability.

Lean continuous improvement is a comprehensive strategy and approach for improving business performance by focusing on the reduction of end-to-end lead time. In simple terms, it maximizes customer value by eliminating common forms of waste that cost businesses valuable time and money—including redundant processing, unnecessary approvals, multiple hand-offs, chasing down information, re-work, wait times and more.

For many retailers, an efficiency diagnostic can be the key to rapid identification (and remediation) of waste. An efficiency diagnostic is a series of focused sessions over a period of three to five days. We identify a single process or functional area that is causing problems or not delivering value and deploy quick wins with measurable improvements.

Every organization has waste—the key is to find and eliminate it

We pair Lean principles with retail industry expertise to help you achieve service, quality, and financial goals. Our approach emphasizes rapid identification of opportunities to improve performance, allowing you to begin testing changes within weeks. Our experienced team works with you to:

Assess the current environment using data analytics, customer feedback, and process observation.

Develop a future state vision to achieve measurable impact on efficiency, customer experience, and financial performance.

Our consultants have deep retail industry experience and understand the challenges of your environment, your legacy systems, and your unique processes and operations—experience that enables us to help you eliminate waste in order to: